The Storytelling Adventures of Red Phoenix

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After San Francisco the next and last stop was Montreal for the SCCC (Storytellers of Canada) national conference. However I did make one final pit stop in Toronto to try and rest as the all the travelling was beginning to take it toll and to it gave me the chance to say goodbye to people in the hostel that had made Toronto home over the last month, and who I hope our paths will cross again.Thank you so much to Lindon, Pete, Dave, Dimitri, Laura, Sandra, Mary, Anna, Iman, Stephie, Nicole, Marijanka, Mossy, Hendrik, Kathrin, Amelia, Gordiano, Robbie, Goran, Marcin and Vera for making Toronto unforgettable, it was a barrel of a time!

With one last teary glance I said farewell and headed for Montreal a few days later than planned, and several hours later thanks to the bus deciding it had its own special timetable (at this point in my travels I was so over the bus journeys, to other WCMT travellers I give this piece of advice… take the train, or in fact just treat yourself to the plane, you’ll have more energy to do your work!) Finally reached Montreal, tired, hungry and on the brink of a hypo, then I found the storytellers with food, and soon sleep and the world was a better place!

The next morning the conference started, and just like the NSN conference a whirl of faces and names, workshops and performances filled the area, and information and contacts abound at every avenue. I will admit that my energy levels were not what they had been in Cincinnati, and getting up early and staying up late to catch people to chat about youth storytelling just wasn’t physically possible, and with the venue having no air-con everyone was finding staying awake tricky. However I did manage a conversation here and there, interviews, and I came away from it with pockets of cards to contact people who I knew I wouldn’t get the chance to talk over the weekend. I spoke to Jennifer Caley about how she got the Canadian arts council to recognise storytelling as an art form in its own right, which would hugely beneficial around in UK. Ruthanne Edward’s workshop on Story Slams was a wealth of discussion about getting young/youth into storytelling, and the methods, and the AGM of the conference was unlike any AGM I have ever been too, so much fun and silliness… got to say I approved.

The SCCC 2012 Storyquilt, I so wanted this, its a beautiful idea!!!

I also got to see the Story quilt, which is a bit of a Tradition, a new one is made each year byt the storytellers and the auditioned off to raise money to support the ‘Story Save’ project, which aims to record the voices of the older storytellers in the community, so they aren’t lost forever.

The Lovely Ladies from Ottawa, Gail, Ruthanne, Caitlyn and Me

It was also really lovely to see many of the tellers I had met on my way around Canada, Mary from St John’s, Dan, Donna, Marylyn and Molly from Toronto, and the lovely ladies from Ottawa Gail, Ruthanne and Caitlyn, Dear Ole Winston even turned up on my last night…

Sir Winston, hanging on the wall of the Sir Winston Churchill Pub, Montreal

I can honestly say I never wanted the final hours of my trip to come, and found that I could of happily spent the whole six weeks in each place I went and still had more questions and more contacts to discover. I had some of my pre-trip thoughts confirmed, I had some questions answers, and discovered many more to ask. I was inspired by people, stories, places, moments, chocolate and the generosity of everyone I met my way around. I will be forever grateful for the opportunity that the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust has awarded me, and have appreciated each and every moment people have spared to talk, listen and advise me, and even cheered me on from back home. I may not always had as much time with people as I would have like, but every second counted and has touched, inspired, and altered me forever.

I have learnt that for all I want to achieve in my project this trip was not the whole conversation, but the beginning of a dialogue, so I know already that I will return and hopefully often and soon.

I was meant to leave Toronto on the 11th to head to St John’s, but after having a wonderful lunch with Donna Dudinsky after the Storytent last Saturday and finding out that the Racontuers (a storyslam in Toronto) meeting was also on the 11th I changed my flight and attended.

It was a very interesting evening, as only a couple of days before I had been sat in Dan Yashinsky’s garden talking about youth storytelling and how he percieved that a lot more talented young people were interested in storytelling in the UK than in Canada. But when I entered the wonderfully named ‘No One Writes To The Colonel’ 460 College St, what a feast beheld my eyes.

Racontuers Story Slam @ No One Writes To The Colonel

The bar was packed, every available seat was taken, people gathered huddle in any space they could get, it was amazing to see just how many people had turned out on a hot summer evening to cram themselves into the wonderfully record bespotted performance space. And even more amazing was that the vast majority were 20-40yr olds, with the occassional older folk peppered amoungst the crowd.

As the evening began and the stories started it proved to be such a range, and dynamic of tellers. The theme this month was ‘Music’ and before each teller told the MC announced their name and their favourite song, which already gave an idea of the person we were about to see. Coming from the UK my ear is not atuned so much to the personal stories which seem to heavily fill repetoires in Canada and the US, and it should be noted that Racontuers only accepts personal stories, so I did not enter as a teller, for I have had no experince with playing with personal tales. Some tellers told of seeing their favourite band live, some told of how they developed their first crush on the favourite popstar, some told of their own personal connection to music through playing, and just like everything to do with music there was also a touch or sex, drugs and rock and roll!

Tellers told in blocks of three with a break inbetween each block, where tellers were greeted by eager audience members to congratulate them on their telling. All tellers told through a mic and even the quiet ones could be heard by all. Some tellers were newbies and other were old hats, but all were welcomed by a very story hungry audience.

At this point I must admit I was more fasinated by the dynamic in the room than the stories, not that they weren’t good, but like I say I’m not use to personal tales and at times for me it felt a bit like watching stand-up comedy without the punch lines. I didn’t not enjoy it, and I don’t mean to sound like a story snob, because believe me anything that can generate the amount of people in a room for storytelling I’m all for, its just I found it hard to recognise it as storytelling that I am familiar with for it is such a different style. But I have been told that is also how it feels in reverse, many people who have only had personal tales find it hard to listen to what they determine over here as ‘folk tales’ (which back home refers to a certain genre of stories, rather than a generic term for any fictional tale). This in itself is an interesting insight into the trip, does this mean to be more appealing to more people, we as a storytelling community in the UK have to look to this, or is it just a cultural difference. Having spoken a lot to Csenge Zalka at the NSN conference about this (Csenge is from Hungary, which also has a long history of ‘folk’ tales) we both, having worked with youth in our own countries have seen how ‘folk’ tales are still popular, and so at this stage my belief is that it is more of a cultural thing, but that we must be aware that personal tales are a great way of giving a voice to young people who can often feel like no one is listening.

But net result is that far from being devoid of youth talent, Toronto has a wealth of youth talent bubbling away, but it might need a to be sort out in a new fashion.

And then before I knew it, and far too soon I was on a flight to St John’s, and flying into the airport I saw hilltops and coast line which could have been mistaken for Scotland, and colourful houses which would look at home in Balormory. The place is awash with Irish accents, and I have finally found out why East Killbride in Scotland doesn’t have just a Killbride, cos its here in Canada, so East Killbride is VERY east!

I arrived at the hostel at 6pm dropped my bags headed into town (finding within mins a chocolate shop… my true chocoholic nature is far from the surface) grabbed some food and found Hava Java, the venue for tonight’s Storytelling circle, and finally met at long last Dale Jarvis, which was a strange first meeting as I many an email has gone back and forth, and so many people have talked to me about him it really didn’t feel like a first meeting. What an evening of diverse stories, and international tellers, besides myself there were tellers from Spain, Wales, Ireland and then plenty of local talent. After which Dale and his partner took me up to Signal hill to look down over St John’s at night, a beautiful sight… a good way to end the day.

Friday the 13th was – and that is all that can be said, roll on the radio interview at 9am local time Saturday 14th, but I shall leave with that view…